Bungalow – an Independence-era Indian clubhouse below First Avenue

Bungalow occupies a basement room on First Avenue in the East Village, reached by a staircase built to recall the descent into Amritsar's Golden Temple. It is run by chef Vikas Khanna together with restaurateur Jimmy Rizvi, whose Bombay House Hospitality group also owns GupShup, Chote Miya and Ammi. Khanna, born in Amritsar, was executive chef of Junoon in the Flatiron District when it earned a Michelin star in 2011, and Bungalow, which opened in March 2024, is the restaurant he has called one of the last he intends to open. The room recreates the vanished country clubs of Independence-era India, and the kitchen travels across a menu that spans the breadth of the country's 28 states. It holds a Bib Gourmand in the MICHELIN Guide, and the New York Times critic Priya Krishna gave it a rare three-star review in her debut piece as interim restaurant critic.

01The room and the setting

The doors open onto a lounge built like a clubhouse library, with a custom chandelier, paintings of sepoys guarding bungalows and groomsmen in blush-pink turbans, and rattan furniture shipped from India around a bookshelf of Indian cookbooks crowned by a framed photograph of Khanna's sister. A main dining room then opens out into a backyard patio, creating an indoor-outdoor sequence that runs the length of the building.

Beyond the library, the dining room is cut from deep green and gold, hung with handcrafted peacocks that the chef's sister commissioned years before the restaurant existed, and roofed by a skylight draped in faux jasmine vines that floods the space with daylight. Antique brass cookware from a museum in Manipal hangs above the semi-open kitchen, alongside original artwork by the British-Indian artist Alexander Gorlizki. The interiors were designed by Shaila Rizvi, creative director of Bombay House Hospitality and sister of owner Jimmy Rizvi.

02The chef

Vikas Khanna grew up in Amritsar before training and working across New York kitchens, eventually becoming executive chef of Junoon in the Flatiron District, the restaurant that earned him a Michelin star in 2011. He went on to host MasterChef India, write dozens of cookbooks and build restaurants in Dubai before returning to open a restaurant under his own name in New York. At Bungalow, his vision is personal: every dish draws from the regional traditions of India, reinterpreted with precision and served with the warmth that has always defined his cooking.

Insider tip

Open Tuesday–Sunday, 5pm–11pm; closed Monday; groups of eight-plus need 40–45 days' notice.

Bungalow opened its doors on 23 March 2024, the same date as the birthday of Khanna's sister Radhika, who died in 2022 and whose memory still runs through the room, from the peacocks she commissioned to the photograph on the library shelf.

03What to order

The current menu lists Spice Roasted Pineapple with coconut, lemon, mustard seed and curry leaves, and a Smoked Sweet Potato Chaat finished with green mango sauce and chickpea droplets, alongside an Eggplant Bharta of Japanese aubergine, smoked onions, peas, tomatoes and cilantro. Anarkali Chicken arrives with pomegranate-chilli, cilantro chutney and watermelon radish, while the Alleppey Shrimp Curry leans on coconut, tamarind and green mango, and the Nilgiri Tandoori Prawns on green chilli, mint and curry leaves.

Ammi's Lamb Chops, dressed in cashew butter, poppy seed and kumquat pickle, and a Chicken Biryani finished with saffron, crispy onion and mint are among the dishes the kitchen singles out as its own favourites. To finish, Mango Three Way pairs homemade mango ice cream with raspberry coulis and candied fruits.

04When to go and booking

Bungalow is open Tuesday to Sunday from 5pm to 11pm, with last seating at 10pm, and closed on Mondays. Groups of eight or more are asked to book 40 to 45 days in advance, the restaurant does not carry high chairs and cannot accommodate strollers inside the dining room, and larger parties are directed to sister restaurant GupShup. The Infatuation included Bungalow on its list of New York's toughest reservations within months of opening, and demand has held since the New York Times gave it a three-star review.

05The neighbourhood

The restaurant sits on First Avenue in the East Village, a stretch of the neighbourhood Khanna associates with the block of East 6th Street once nicknamed Indian Row for its cluster of Indian eateries, even though Bungalow itself trades that old strip's steam-table formula for a single, considered kitchen of its own.

For a weekend. For a lifetime.